Page 44 of Roses Are Dead
“As well as can be expected. We won’t know for a few weeks.”
“What’s wrong with her?”
Roishin studied me. “She has Non-Hodgkins’s lymphoma, and if your club brothers did their research, you’d know that already.”
“Maybe.”
Roishin sighed at my non-answer. “Listen, I’m tired. Do you mind if we save the inquisition until tomorrow?”
“Is that what you think this is?”
“Isn’t it? I mean, if I were in your shoes, I wouldn’t have been half as nice.”
“I’m not nice.”
She stood up and fired over her shoulder, “You are nice. All of this stuff you gave me is above and beyond nice. I don’t deserve it.”
“Don’t.” She was being too hard on herself. And she was bossing me around. I didn’t like it.
“What? Don’t complain? Don’t caution you about spending money on me? I’ll be gone in a month.”
I shot back, “That doesn’t mean you have to suffer like you did at Carl’s.”
She shut her mouth.
“If I’m buying you shit, I’m buying it. And it will be the best shit I can afford. Got it?”
Her face ran through a bunch of expressions from anger to mutiny. Finally, she said, “Fine. Buy what you want. Dress me, pamper me, I don’t care. It won’t work. Oh, and you forgot to buy me an athame.” After firing that parting shot, she beelined for her lair.
Once she disappeared into the basement, I did a quick search on my phone for what the hell she wanted.
A dagger.
Jackson’s words haunted me. She’d be the one who’d stick a knife in it. And I’d be the dumbass idiot who handed it to her. I stared at the table. There was an overhang that blocked the moonlight from one corner. I pushed the legs a few more inches to the right so the entire surface was illuminated.
She needed a knife. I’d seen those decorative letter openers at the store and dismissed them. Why buy something cheap and store-bought that might hurt more than actually kill? If I was gonna get stabbed in the back, I wanted it clean, sharp, and deadly. I knew just the person to call for one of those.
“Who is this and what the fuck you want?”
Fin was never friendly, but he’d gotten even more cantankerous over the years. “It’s Bear. I need a knife.”
“You know what to do, haul your ass down here and tell me what you want in person. I don’t take orders over the phone.”
Then he hung up on me.
Which was just fine. Fin might be the grumpy sort, but he made good steel. And his wife, Betty Jo, was an expert judge of character. She also worked magic with leather. If pretending Roishin was my woman was what it took to convince people that this wasn’t what Carl said it was, I’d do this the right way.
Poor Roishin didn’t know what she was in for.
11
Roishin
I woke before Bear did and moved the table and all the altar paraphernalia out of the way. His running shoes sat outside. They had to be damp with the dew, yet, as filthy as they were, I didn’t blame him for not bringing them inside.
There was a bristle brush under the sink. It was brand new, never used. Which was a shame. Tools should be used. I sat down outside, bundled up in a blanket and shivered while I sloughed off the remaining caked mud and grime. The fancy running shoes would never be pink again, but they were a far cry better than before. And I needed to atone for my outburst last night.
“What are you doing to my shoes?”
